2011 half season driver rankings part 2: 15-6

Part two of the mid-season driver rankings covers the ten drivers up to sixth place.

Read my verdict, a selection of your comments on each drivers, and share your view on the best drivers of the year so far.

Paul di Resta, Force India, Silverstone, 2011

15. Paul di Resta

Beat team mate in qualifying

7/9

Beat team mate in race

3/7

Races finished

8/9

Laps spent ahead of team mate

281/509

The reigning DTM champion has made an impressive start to his F1 career: particularly in qualifying, where he has regularly beaten his more experienced team mate.

He scored a point in his first race (aided, admittedly, by the disqualification of the Saubers) and repeated the feat at Malaysia.

Since then he’s missed opportunities to score with a few rookie mistakes, notably at Montreal and Silverstone – though the latter came after a botched pit stop had already ruined his race.

Has come into the sport “cold” and has thoroughly trounced his team-mate in qualifying. Has been unlucky with some over-officious stewarding and perhaps needs to recognise when to pull his nose out. Otherwise he would really be hammering Sutil in the standings too.James_mc

14. Nick Heidfeld

A podium finish in his second start for Renault justified the team’s decision to opt for experience over youth when choosing who to put in Robert Kubica’s sadly vacant seat.

Heidfeld had a public hurry-up from team principal Eric Boullier during the season as he was lagging behind Vitaly Petrov in qualifying.

But he remains as ever a very safe pair of hands in the races. Had it not been for a collision with Kamui Kobayashi in Montreal he’d have scored in the last six races in a row. As it is he’s now moved ahead of Petrov in the points standings.

I was expecting more out of Heidfeld this season, and although he was unlucky at times (Canada), he still hasn’t been consistently stronger than his team mate.Todfod

13. Sebastien Buemi

He turned the tables at the start of this season, finding speed and durability form the new Pirelli tyres much more quickly than his team mate.

But the balance of power has begun to shift once more and Buemi finds himself under pressure once again as we enter the second half of 2011.

He has been extracting a lot of performance from the Toro Rosso, but Alguersuari is catching up fast. He’s been solid and consistent, and he’d make a good number two at Red Bull if Webber decides to retire. He’s made it into the top ten at qualifying, but he needs to step his game up to stay ahead in the Toro Rosso driver war.PortuGoose

12. Michael Schumacher

A new car and a change in tyre supplier has not brought about the instantaneous return to form Schumacher’s legions of fans will have been hoping for after 2010.

There has been discernible improvement, but while Nico Rosberg has reached Q3 at every race, Schumacher has missed out four times.

There have been flashes of the old Schumacher in some races, notably in Canada, where only the impossibility of defending his position against cars with DRS cost him a podium.

But there have been some clumsy mistakes as well – he’s lost the front wing off his car in collisions in Istanbul, Valencia and Silverstone. The comeback is still refusing to come good.

A mixed season. Has had some very poor races such as Turkey, but then again has had some monster performances like at Canada. His results again aren’t reflecting how well he has driven at times. His racecraft is still questionable, but it could simply be that the other drivers aren’t scared of him any more.sw6569

Since then he’s continued to exploit the Sauber C30’s low tyre wear to make inroads into the points. Last weekend he scored his best result so far, seventh, by keeping his pit stops to a minimum.

His start to the season was disrupted by that nasty shunt at Monaco. He had the sense to step down in Canada when he still wasn’t fit enough, and has got back on form since then.

It’s not been all plain sailing: he collected two penalties for collisions in Shanghai. That aside he’s made an excellent start to his F1 career.

It’s difficult not to like this guy – he made everyone smile with his 7th place debut finish, and although outclassed by Kobayashi in the succeeding races, his finding his feet again after his Monaco crash, including a 7th place finish at his first Silverstone visit.Electrolite

10. Timo Glock

Who knows at what point Timo Glock realised the second all-CFD Virgin Racing car wasn’t going to be any better than the first one. Probably at some point during those first laps with the car at Jerez.

Faced with another long season plugging away at the back of the field, Glock is resigned to making the most out of what he’s got.

He was ecstatic with his Monaco qualifying lap, even if he wasn’t able to overhaul either of the Lotuses on that occasion. At Silverstone he was keeping Jarno Trulli behind when the Lotus dropped out.

He’s got to be on the list of any front-running team with a vacancy for 2012.

Another season as a backmarker, surely not something a driver of his talent deserves. Hopefully the team improves or he moves to a better one, as he’s clearly talented and it would be great to see him driving a good car (again).Enigma

9. Heikki Kovalainen

Another driver who deserves better machinery than he has at his disposal.

Kovalainen has been little troubled by his team mate so far this year and has grabbed opportunities to move the T128 up the order – such as his appearance in Q2 at Silverstone.

Quietly doing the job at Lotus and has been the one to take the opportunity of getting into Q2 when it comes up. It seems like he genuinely cares about making Lotus better and it doesn’t matter to him that he’s at the back, so long as he’s racing. Heikki is fast becoming one of my favourite drivers.Icthyes

7. Felipe Massa

Massa took a fair kicking from Fernando Alonso last year, and it’s to his credit that he’s picked himself up after it.

Buoyed by a change of tyres for 2011, he is performing noticeably better.

The qualifying scoreline still makes for painful reading but Massa has been within hundredths of Alonso at some races. He made a habit of jumping his team mate at the start earlier in the year, too.

He had a particularly good run in China, passing Lewis Hamilton early on and finishing in front of Alonso, albeit in sixth place.

Despite claims Massa’s season is looking better than 2010, he is always the last of the top three teams. He has showed some good performances in qualifying almost matching Alonso like in Canada, and beat him in Malaysia and China, but he has yet to finish higher than fifth. After nine races, three podiums a win by his team mate, podiums should be in reach for the Brazilian.Fixy

The Red Bull duo are the only drivers to have completed every racing lap this year – and Webber was ahead for just six of them.

True, he’s had some problems with KERS during the year, but this alone isn’t enough to explain the gap to his team mate – Vettel has not been immune to similar problems.

Early in the year Webber was having a much harder time with the new tyres than his team mate – wearing them out more quickly and not getting the same performance out of them. He’s made significant progress in that regard since then.

China was his stand-out performance of the first half of the year. Left 18th on the grid after failing to get through Q1 on hard tyres without KERS, he raced through the field to an excellent third place.

Some good drives, but he has the same car as the champion and is 80 points behind him. Amazing in China though.Daykind

152 comments on “2011 half season driver rankings part 2: 15-6”

Kovalainen is more and more like Barrichello or Fisichella: showing brilliant performances with underperforming teams, but underperforming with race-winning machinery.

Don’t forget his only win came in a race (Humgary 2008) where Felipe Massa was running untroubled for victory, until the brazilian’s engine blow away with four laps to go. At that same year, his team-mate was world champion.

For fks sake…. Much of the reason Webber is lacking in points is because

Australia… Chassis
Malaysia… KERS in fastest Q3 run (so the first was faster but sohuldn’t have been), AND KERS off the line down to 10th
China… Quali 18th
Spain… stratergy meant most of the race behind slow Alonso
Monaco… Pit stop should have put him 7th put him 14th.
Canada…. KERS quali, should have been on pole with the KERS boost. BUt had to start 4th because of it. Hit by Hamilton (not Webbers fault) then battled through several cars several times to get through the finish just behind teammate despite vettel’s easy run
Britain… Start??? Started same as VEttel then stopped and VEttel went straight past. No explanation and even brundle and coulthard couldn’t work it out

Sure, Webber hasn’t had the pace of Vettel for most of the first half of the seaosn, but the reason his pioints are so far behind is because WEbber has had problems during that have effect his Quali and/or start. These being the 2 most important times during a race to have things working properly.

For above…
Europe…. Having to short shift to keep his gearbox alive rather than race for position

Excluding Spain quali, Vettel’s problems have all been mid race. Meaning he has been, bar that one time had fully working car and machinery for his quali.

AND has had everything working to get off the line each and every race.

Radios and KERS not working at times during the race don’t matter as much as the positions are more or less set by then as opposed to the start where not having KERS is 8 or 9 positions as Webber found out in Malaysia

And I really don’t understand how these races inwhich barely any mistakes where made could be judged as WORSE than someone who

Hit several drivers in Monaco
Several ‘meetings’ with the stewards
A Penalty
Having to make an extra stop compared to stratergy in Malaysia?/China the one with Alonso.

Top 6 should be

1) Vettel…. made most of his car
2) Alonso…. really performing well and pushing his team.. I mean Ferrari
3) Webber… some great performances, Malaysia, China both standout. Driven through the field several times. Had a bad car at critical times more often than not
4) Hamilton… for being ahead of Button every race he didn’t hit anyone
5) Button for being consistant, despite hitting his teammate. Good driving in Canada. ANd solid points scorer everywhere else, but nothing spectacular. Started 5th or Hamilton 10th in GB. Within laps Hamilton had caught up to Button despite the same car being used for both.
6) Rosberg… Beating Schumacher again, but by a bit less. Been mostly under the radar, horrible car on hard tyres in race trim. Out performing his teammate in similiar machinery

“Should have” sums up Webber’s season. In the fastest car, he should have won a race. Vettel’s season last year could have been summed up the similarly- but I’m even more proud that he came through and won anyway.

Webber had a problem in Australia that developed after Vettel and Hamilton left in their dust. He lost nothing in Monaco since he was struggling to keep up with the top 3 in Monaco before the bad pitstop. In Canada, you mention Webber’s lack of qualifying KERS but not Vettel’s lack in Spanish qualifying?

Hamilton has had collisions, but aside from that has impressed and extarcted more from his car than Webber has. In Spain he heckled Vettel for the win, Australia he was beating the second RB7 before either driver suffered a problem, and of course in China he actually beat Vettel. More than enough to top Webber in this ranking.

David, Webber was struggling with the Chassis in practice and then in Quali and then in the race. THe race hadn’t even started before it was shown that Webber was having problems. Funnily enough he has since changed chassis’ and the problem is resolved. The original got sent back to fixing.

I mentioned Webber’s lack of KERS in Canada because I’m talking about why Webber’s end result isn’t showing what he did. Vettel had the same problem in Spain but only lost 1 position not 3. I’m not talking about Vettel. He has done a great job and used the car to do almost all that is possible.

Hamilton has had good races, but also bad. Monaco, australia, china, europe and gb, but also 2 horrible in Malaysia and driving like a tool in Monaco. Really no excuse for that.

You say Webber only developed the problem after the drivers had left the grid but his times in quali disagree
Vettel:
1:25.296

1:24.090

1:23.529

Webber:
1:25.900 (+.604)

1:24.658 (+.568)

1:24.395 (+.866)

I’ve included the differences. Quite clearly the problem was about 6 tenths and Webber couldn’t push any more without over driving the car which caused in in Q3 when that happened to push out to around 8 and half tenths.

Gonna be
1. Vettel- A powerhouse. Hasn’t had the most spectacular performances, but has barely put a foot wrong. Had the best car, but used it to perfection.
2. Alonso- Some good performances. Gets the place over Hamilton because of his chaotic couple of races.
3. Hamilton- Went off the rails, dropping him down, but has been a great racer the rest of the time, fast in a not spectalucar car.
4. Button- Canada was a great race, he’s shown good form elsewhere
5. Rosberg- solid in an average car, plugging away to get some good results, still beating Schumacher.

Depending how harsh/lenient Keith is on Hamilton’s collisions, him and Alonso might swap. Possibly Button and Rosberg will swap too.

Heikki 9th? Thinking about that I would have to agree. He has been comprehensively beating Jarno, who lets face it is still a quick driver, I just wish these supposed Power steering issues would be sorted so we can see real parity between the 2.

A lot of people on here are going to disagree with the Heidfeld position but I’m not sure why. He has been better than Petrov this season even though the points are close. Qualifying would suggest Petrov has greater one lap pace but when it comes to the race he really becomes a non-entity with the experience of Nick showing through.

I fail to see how Heidfeld is in front of Di Resta. Heidfeld has been a disappointment by hardly being able to outpace Petrov. Di Resta on the other hand is thrashing his team mate in his rookie year. Sure, he’s gonna make rookie mistakes, but every rookie does. Hamilton was ranked first in 2007 despite making thousands of mistakes. Di Resta has been one of the most impressive drivers this season and easily deserves to be in the top ten in my eyes.

Glock is also too high up. Last year he was amazing, but this year I don’t recall any brilliance like in Singapore 2010. In fact I think he’s barely been noticable (not that he’s driven badly, not just not as spectacularly as Kovalainen).

The biggest mistake however in my humble opinion is Webber being sixth. What is the justification for that? He’s been torn to pieces by Vettel. Of course, he’s second in the championship, but really, who wouldn’t be with the RB7 at their disposal? He hasn’t finished a single race in front of his team mate and has only outqualified him twice – and let’s be honest, Barcelona was down to Vettel having issues with his KERS. Kobayashi should easily be in front of him and possibly Massa based on his performances this year.

I think more and more than people are just reading others’ comments and retyping them into boxes. Learn from what you read ehre then repeat.

It’s close between them. Sutil has the upper hand, but for a rookie (remembering that while he has been very good at open wheel single seaters in the past, he hasn’t driven them lately, but isn’t new to high level racing given he is a DTM champion [which is no mean feat if you look at drivers like coulthard, hakkinen and paffet have done]).

9 – 10 – Sutil just, Di Resta Moral victory
11 – 10 – Di Resta just
15 – 11 – Di Resta win
13 – DNF – Sutil win, was faster that weekened
13 – 12 – Di Resta just
7 – 12 – Sutil. Was higher until contact. Lucky to continue after contact, but would have been higher without it, lower without luck. Di Resta failed overtaking tihs weekend (although not as bad as several of the recent WDC’s….)
DNF – DNF (18) – Di Resta in quali. But a penalty and crahsing out didn’t prove to be a good weekend for him. Sutil hit the wall at turn 7. Not one either would look fondly back on in performance terms
9 – 14 – Sutil win
11 – 15 – Di Resta was better in Quali as per normal (good sign for Di Resta), but a bad pit stop put him down the order. He later ruined Buemis race (or what he had of it) by destroying Buemis rear tyre.

So all in all, Di Resta is showing up to be a great talent. Sutil is no easy driver having easily outclassed Liuzzi who isn’t exactly the slowest driver in the world. L this year has destroyed NK who is the slowest driver in the world.

Sutil is just better than Di Resta so far, and and is a far more consistant driver.

Di Resta is showing more signs of speed and is qualifying much better. One could wonder if he could have won Spa in ’09. Di Resta is making mistakes though, at several races this year. Not stupid mistakes, but clumsy ones non the less.

If his pace improves and he gets more climatised to single seaters again (given his experience in the lsat efw years has been friday practices, not bad for a rookie, but not the best) he should been a WDC contendor in a top car.

Sutil is a solid midfield driver what Di Resta has done is no mean feat.

I’m not a particular fan of either nor the team so my facts could be slightly off or I may have missed something. But overall, not a thrashing, in fact Sutil has been better while Di Resta has performed very well to date.

I’m not getting why Nico is in the top 5 this season. Last year he was consistently quick, and maximised on the car’s potential, but this year, he seemed really poor on numerous occassions. He didn’t show up in Monaco and Canada, and other than the Chinese GP, he hasn’t done anything special enough to belong in the top 5. He hasn’t been great at a lot of venues this year, and honestly, Schumacher has looked more impressive than Nico on a lot of Sundays. The whole of last season Nico looked like a superior driver to Schumacher. This season, he has looked only marginally better, so I honestly do not understand the huge difference in the rankings.

I wonder if it is because of NR’s greater number of higher quali positions, and the fact that he is leading MS in points…still…after a year and a half of MS’s return. Merc had a chance to build this year’s car more to MS’s liking which we all know they tried to do after MS struggled for front end grip last year. But that hasn’t phazed NR one bit.NR has not been in the fender benders MS has, and seems consistant in races.

I think the point here is that MS, as a 7 time WDC, is the one that is supposed to have been trouncing NR…many thought that would happen after a few races of MS getting acclimatized to F1 upon his return…now it is a season and a half and MS has not phazed NR one bit, in fact NR still leads him in points…MS has had usually better starts than NR, but tends to squander them with front wing damage.

NR sits ‘best of the rest’ after the top 3 teams even though he hasn’t ‘looked’ as strong as last year. But isn’t that because last year NR looked stronger vs. MS because MS was understandably needing time to get reaquainted with F1…but MS still looks to be in that mode in a way, or at least if he has a better handle on things he has squandered it and NR still leads…there was a time when having MS as a teammate meant huge pressure…either MS no longer phazes drivers and doesn’t apply pressure any longer, or NR is great at dealing with the pressure. It’s a two-sided coin…perhaps it is NR’s handling of MS that is the reason other drivers are not phazed by MS being on the track, and they’re all taking the fight to him without hesitation.

Bottom line for me…if you are one who puts MS on a pedestal for all he has done in F1, then NR deserves to be on a pedestal for how he has dealt with MS as a teammate.

I also think Button is just a bit in front of Hamilton (although HAM does look like he got the right turn in Silverstone again), if not for that pitstop Button might have finished ahead of Hamilton and Webber there. He would have finished all races and been probably second in the WDC in front of Webber.

Rosberg deserves being in 5th, as he has always been in Q3 and got solid results in most races, but not in front of either McLaren.

If we consider the relative development budgets of mercedes against sauber, it is almost unbelievable that Kamui could be getting into q3. Qualifying was his weakness last season, so it is mightly impressive how he has upped his game

I am with you there Tom, Webber has been given the role of backing up Vettel and the team strategy for Mark is that of getting “safe” points for the team except when car issues have had him start from the tail end, then he is asked for and has given performances reminiscent of Schuis glory years setting fastest lap after fastest lap and carving through the field. Some people may rank him outside the top six but he is definitely without a doubt the number one number two, just ask Dieter.

Tom, I am a great believer in Jenson and I would love to see Jenson & Mark as team-mates, I reckon it could go either way, and I reckon Mark would be the top qualifier and might even look like Seb V. if the car was as good as the RB. relative to the rest.

Why is Schumi only 12., in team-mate comparison he has done better than Massa or Webber, is Rosberg really that good? Answer is no. So basically this is rated how well do you do compared to your team-mate for example Kovalainen has beaten Trulli almost every time so there are two possibilities 1.Trulli is a bad driver ( I recommend) 2. Kovalainen is better than Schumacher ( I don’t recommend)
If this is how you do it then why don’t you put Webber in 24. place where he belongs according to this ranking?
And by the way Rosberg is too high, he doesn’t deserve 5th place, maybe 7th he’s just too invisible in races the director doesn’t even bother showing him on the camera because he isn’t doing anything other than “cruising” around.

While I wouldn’t go that far I agree to some extent. Rosberg is a good driver doing a very good job but there are only two things left he has over Schumacher this year: he can extract the pace in qualifying and he doesn’t crash when being ahead of his teammate. While I agree that should put him ahead of his teammate I don’t agree that it should put him that much ahead. I hope Schumacher will find his pace in qualifying (ask your pal vettel..) so he can stay out of midfield trouble and I believe then we can see him consistently on par with Rosberg or ahead.

Schumacher is supposed to be a seven time world champion, but keeps crashing into the back of people. How many races has he lost his front wing this season? He drove very well in Canada, and his race pace has looked quite good over the course of the season but he keeps making stupid errors,

First of all he is 42 years old but still, when conditions are difficult, he is faster than Rosberg. He made mistake in Silverstone but Heidfeld in Canada was also a victim of Kamui weird driving on wet.

Despite penalty, Michael had faster and more constant times than Rosberg in Silverstone.

ps. When track was still wet Schumacher and Hamiltons overtaking moves into Copse on slicks…..masterpiece!

The age excuse doesn’t really wash with me. He should be judged on his performances on their own merit.

The incident at Silverstone was Schumacher’s fault. He was using DRS and braked too late to compensate for this, he looked on course for a very good result if he hadn’t done that however as his race pace was very good.

It’s a shame that 90 per cent of the races are run under bone dry conditions otherwise Schumacher would be right up the front again :)

Sure it was his fault but things happen. Someone should make a statistic on how many penalties are given per race and another for penalties per incident per race for the last 30 years. I guess its pretty much impossible to do that as one would have to review hundreds of races but I’m pretty sure we had a peak in 2007 and are still close to that level. Sure, stupidity and really bad behaviour on track needs to be punished but a lot of stuff simply happens, its racing …

MS was predicted by Ross Brawn prior to the 2010 season and MS’s return, to be WDC for 2010…a year and a half later he is behind his teammate in points still, and is merely being compared to NR, someone who has never even won a race (no offence intended NR, your day may come)…

By now most thought he would certainly have gelled with Merc and developed the car to be fighting with the top drivers for wins, yet when he seems to be at least having a better day, he squanders it.

To me, by now MS has shown his return to be a massive disappointment for those who had higher hopes for him, and it should be small consolation that all he is doing is improving relative to NR…throw Canada out the door…it was too topsy turvy to call MS’s drive much other than luck of the draw in timing weather wise and tire wise…and then he immediately was back to his usual spot behind NR in the next race.

button and hamilton should be in this category and not top 5, as they have failed to get the points their car deserves. i think di resta should be above schumacher and glock also.
my top 5 would be 1. vettel 2. alonso 3.kovaleinen 4. rosberg
5. kobayashi or di resta
my scores would be for not only results, but whether the driver is getting the best possible from his car. vettel, alonso, kovaleinen and rosberg are extracting the most speed from the cars they have.

But he managed to get a podium on the opening race, then collected some good points since then,I do agree he had some disappointing result but that still can convince me that he was lagging behind Barrichello & Sutil.

Can’t believe Webber is that high up. He should be behind Heikki, Massa, Kobayashi, Glock at the very least. What has he done to be ahead of all these drivers.

The Red Bull is easily the fastest car whatever be the rules on the blown diffuser. He has seemed powerless while chasing Vettel or while defending from Alonso. Even if one removes Vettel from the race results of every race, Webber is going to win only one of the nine races.

At least Massa can argue that his strategy and pitstops have been badly managed, what defence does Webber have?

I like these rankings. Webber is a difficult one to place because he is being comprehensively beaten by Vettel but is still second in the championship. Think I would put him behind Kobayashi.

Would have Petrov and Algersuari higher from yesterday and Schumacher, Glock and Buemi lower.

5. Rosberg
4. Hamilton
3. Button
2. Alonso
1. Vettel

I would put Button in front of Hamilton because Lewis is capable of better results in that car but hasn’t achieved them because of his own errors. Button is definitely the slower of the two but Hamilton has made too many mistakes so far.

In 2010 his half-season ranking was 9th, so perhaps he really is stronger this year. The last few races have been the opposite of the first ones for him, and hopefully he’ll have a good end to the season, better than 2010 where he was ranked 16th.

Despite claims Massaâs season is looking better than 2010, he is always the last of the top three teams. He has showed some good performances in qualifying almost matching Alonso like in Canada, and beat him in Malaysia and China, but he has yet to finish higher than fifth. After nine races, three podiums a win by his team mate, podiums should be in reach for the Brazilian.Fixy

Apart from a typo (“three podiums a win” which should be “three podiums and a win”) I’m happy to have my first mention in an article, and fittingly for my favourite driver!

I thought 2010 was better for Massa, at least in the first half, but in both occasions after some good race he had some horrible ones. Also, this year the Ferrari is further from the Red Bull so it’s more understandable why he has not had podiums, but Alonso has and so should he. In 2010 he had two podiums in the first two races and also led the championship for one race. This year he’s 6th from the beginning rather than having some good performances and then bad ones, so he’s more consistent but still average.

I just feel that Massa’s been closer to Alonso this year and the first rule is beat your team mate :P He looks more lively and likely to do something while last year I mostly thought he was out of his depth. His results and qualifying on paper may be worse than 2010 but strangely, I feel more confident in him. Perhaps I’m just insane. :P

Yes, and if only he had optimal strategies and pitstops, he’d almost certainly have had at least a few more Top 5 results.

Webber’s luck finally turned around in 2010 after so many years of bad luck, so you’d think it’d be Massa’s turn next, who’s probably one of the few other drivers apart from Webber to have a tendency for a lot of bad luck.

I think that Rosberg’s already too high. His qualifying has been good this year, but his racing has generally been average.

It seems that he generally goes backwards in the first few laps, and then often gets stuck in the midfield. However, to his credit, the car’s race pace is poor, and he hasn’t been involved in the incidents that Schumacher has.

It seems Schumacher’s improved more than Rosberg from 2010 to 2011, and that really isn’t a good sign for Nico.

To be fair to Rosberg, I think all that does is show that Schumacher had more room for improvement compared to last season. Which we all knew he had.

I’ve mentioned this on the forum, but Peter Windsor did an interview with Ross Brawn in which (for the first time ever for me) Ross gives plain praise and admits Rosberg is just getting more out of the car than Schumacher is.

âFirst, Nico is doing a fantastic job,â he replies. âHeâs set a very high reference for Michael to match and beat. And weâve not done a great car this year, as I say. Weâre struggling a bit with the rear tyres, weâre struggling with rear tyre consistency, weâre having to look at how we set the car up to look after that situation. Whether this moves more towards Michael than Nico â or vice versa â I donât know.
I persist: why the speed differential? From where does it mostly come?

âThatâs a very good question!â says Ross ruefully. âMichael pores over the data trying work out where Nicoâs speed comes from. They both apex the corner at similar speeds, so itâs the way you enter and exit that chips away at those hundredths of a second that accumulate into a gain. You couldnât pick a spot or an aspect of a corner and say âNico brakes better than Michaelâ or is âbetter in tractionâ; he just puts a corner together a little bit better than Michael in terms of braking and turning-in. And thatâs a reflection on how good Nico is. He has progressed over the last few years. The reason we asked him to join the team is that we were all impressed with him at Williams but he was a little less consistent there at times. But here he has been really consistent and has fitted in well.â

Agree completely Ral…MS had more room for improvement over last season…and isn’t it fascinating how we have gone from Brawn saying MS will be 2010 WDC, to him saying NR has ‘set a very high reference for Michael to match and beat’…unprecedented in MS’s F1 career. Night and day different to how he has had it throughout his F1 career previous to his return.

Put another way…anyone who might have said a year and a half ago that by mid-2011 NR would still be leading MS in points would have been laughed off this site…

And here NR sits best of the rest…with MS as a teammate…

Huge kudos to NR. Huge feather in his cap. Many drivers were glad to see MS return so they could have an opportunity to race against a 7-time WDC and try to beat him…NR is in the heart of that, and dealing with it just fine. Way to go NR.

But Michael is in his 40s and not in his prime Yet Schu race pace in couple of races has been better than Nico, i don’t think NR will be fully proud of himself by outscoring 40s Michael rather than Michael at his prime. Nico is a very good driver but i don’t think he will be put on the legendary list the like of Senna, Schumacher, Prost etc. If Michael decided to retire and Mercedes does sign Di Resta as Nico teammate, i think Di Resta going to make Nico looks overrated.
And Brawn also said that Michael is still the icon at MGP:
“itâs the first complete car heâs designed. So I think itâs pretty impressive but itâs not where we want to be. Johnâs next car will for sure be a lot better. So weâre a team in transition but a team that for me is transitioning in a very upward direction. And Michael is helping us achieve that, helping us build the team.

âMichael is very involved with visiting the factory, with working with the engineers, with helping them understand where weâve got to focus. And because heâs got such charisma everyone listens! Nico Rosberg is also very effective in this role but of course Michael is this iconic character and when he comes to the factory people listen. He does present things in a way that forces people to challenge him. He doesnât just want to say âdo this, this and thisâ; he wants people to challenge him and to understand why. Itâs rare for him to say âlook, you must change this because I think it will solve the problemâ. He presents the problem and then debates with the engineers about how the problem could be solved. He doesnât have many pre-conceived ideas about how things should be. He has a good, open mind. He provokes debate, provokes discussion. Heâs very good in this respect.â

Ok but I think you are conveniently downgrading MS in defence of him…nobody put a gun to MS’s head to return and obviously he thought he could come back and compete, so he’s fair game as far as I’m concerned. In spite of his age, most people thought he would be on form in no time last year and Brawn even had him as 2010 WDC. And while I agree NR is nowhere near the legendary category (few are), you are putting MS there but at the same time saying it is no big deal and that NR should feel less pride in besting MS due to MS’s age. I think NR is probably feeling huge pride in how he is dealing with a legend as a teammate who is back with his main man Ross Brawn who was so instrumental in so much of MS’s success.

I think it is inevitable that MS is using his experience at the factory…he has that experience so of course he is going to offer it when the end game is to make himself faster on the track ie. I doubt his main focus is to provoke debate and discussion on car solutions so that NR can go faster…unfortunately for him it is still not enough and for every input at the factory he and NR make NR is fine with it and keeping pace just nicely…it’s like he was never phazed by having MS as a teammate.

I think not downgrading, even at his 40s he still could pace Nico in some occasions. Lewis one of that excited about Schumi return also said that Schumi not at his best. So i don’t think NR would feel huge pride on outscoring Michael last year. And to developed a team it took years like Michael at Ferrari, yes it is part of Ross too on Ferrari success but Michael played the biggest part and many expert believe on that. it is your doubt about that but i tend to and i believe many more listen to Ross quotes as he knows better on that.

I think Glock is a little overrated. But i really disagree with Webber and Massa being so high up. Massa has been “good” compared to what he did last year, but he is still not doing well. I think he is just not as bad as last year. I know it is tough, and i really like the guy, but his performance is really disappointing.
Webber have been totally left in the dust by Vettel, yes Vettel has grown to incredible heights and he is really doing well and it is no surprise that he can’t match him, but his starts have just been incredibly bad. Really really bad. When Vettel generally have had very good starts, so it don’t seem to be a problem with the car.
When he has a team mate who is able to not finish below 2nd i think it is in fact very poor that he has only just overtaken JB in the points.
To be unable to match his team mate is one thing, but to be doing worse then other drivers who is in generally slower cars is just not worthy of a 6th place.

Yeah it is very hard, but sometimes they look better then they are because of their situation.
It is not like Timo has totally embarrassed D’Ambrosio who is just a rookie, so i think 10th is too high up in the rankings in my opinion.

Sorry for double post but the funny thing is back in his Mclaren days I doubt I’d have put him as high as 9th in either season. I hope he doesn’t turn into a Fisichella where he can be superb in bad/average cars but fail to deliver in good ones.

Yeah,i definitely think he deserves a better drive. Maybe not a Red Bull,since he was a flop in Macca,but definitely a Williams or a renault(hope he replaces the bloody Petrov,i dont like ppl like him or Maldonado who are in mid-grid teams only because of their pockets,while better drivers,fail to make the grid at all,or like Kovy or Glock,are further down the field in worse cars.

2,3,4 is debatable. I will definitely put Alonso above Hamilton. But should Button be better than Hamilton, I would say so, but it is debatable. Between Button and Alonso, I am inclined to rule in favor of Alonso.

Actually 6 out of 551 is a higher ration than 0 out of 9. but reflects team tactics. Why not look at places gained during the races? If this was your criteria Webber would be far better than Vettel for the season so far. Somebody else will have to work out how this would look for all drivers.

Just saying you can bend statistics any way you want, in the end it is all subjective. Also most of Webbers career he has been ” managing to drag a decent time in qualifying from a car that inevitably fell back in the race” rating Webber based purely on his performance against Vettel does him a disservice .Name your candidate to have done better in Marks place.

Just saying you can bend statistics any way you want, in the end it is all subjective.

You can bend them. But in the vast majority of ways of bending them, Vettel comes out on top (by far).

Also most of Webbers career he has been â managing to drag a decent time in qualifying from a car that inevitably fell back in the raceâ rating Webber based purely on his performance against Vettel does him a disservice

He did do well at Jaguar, but judging him based on his RB efforts isn’t doing him a disservice unless he turns it around. Fisichella, Kovalainen, Barrichello are more examples of drivers who did well in midfield but will be remembered for not delivering in the best cars.

Name your candidate to have done better in Marks place.

We can never truly know the answer, but this isn’t about who could have done better in his place. It’s either about Webber underperforming or Vettel overperforming.

This comment is slightly out of place but the first driver rankings article stops abruptly in the middle of the section about Pastor Maldonado, and it also doesn’t let me comment, I’ve tried refreshing the page and have tried using multiple browsers, but I still have the same problem.

How do Vettel end up 5th?
Can you explain how you count up the scores, since i can’t really see the logic.
Vettel is on top in all your stats except the second to last one, where of cause he is the lowest, but that can only be a good thing, so i don’t see why being on top in every statistic will put him 5th.

Ferrari has generally only 3th best car this year (standings), so that s places 5 and 6… But Alonso is an excellent 2nd in the “all races counted statistics”, so he is much higher then he should be… That s why he is in 1st place… On other hand Webber is massively underperforming with a best car on grid, being only 5th in “all races counted statistics”… That s why he is almost last overall… It will change for sure as many drivers upped their performances (ALG, PĂR, SUT) and some others who are the moment high will probably fade…

But i still don’t see how that can move Vettel to 5th? He might have the fastest car, but by how much? In the races it has usually only been the 2nd fastest car.
What is your formula for calculating the statistics into a final score?

Good joke! ;) The one who suffered with bad luck last year was Alguersuari… You should watch Spanish, Singapore and Korean races again where he lost 10 possible points… Not to mention the unfair penalty in Belgium, where he was demoted from 10th place… Buemi is only moaning again, but the truth is he had no problems in Valencia or Canada last year… And his “bad luck” resulted in benefiting from Schumachers penalty in Monaco to take another point… At Monza he just wasn t quick enough to maintain the position ahead of Barrichello after pitstops… And in other GPs, he wasn t able to reach the top 10… And about this year, he should be very happy with the “3 given” points in Australia, where the Saubers were disqualifyied… The situation is getting back to the second half of 2010 and Buemi is searching for excuses, again…

Last year in Spain Jaime was a bit crazy when he barged into a backmarker. Buemi also had absolutely rotten luck at the beginning of the season where he was taken out constantly on the first lap but at least he got to lead at Canada.

For the last few races it did seem that Buemi was under pressure and his team mate was turning the tables though but Buemi once again has taken control early on. I always felt Jaime had potential but I must admit I’ve lost a lot of faith and during their time together Buemi has been the better of the pair.

One user here wrote the possible reason why it is all happening with the Toro Rosso drivers… It seems that Alguersuari just needs time to get use to the technical things and changes, maybe because of less experience? But after understanding the problems it looks like he has the ability to bounce back and recover… It happened last year and it looks to me it can happen again…
And then it is up to Buemi how he will handle the pressure, but he was struggling with it last year making mistakes in races and losing ground in qualifying…

You could be right Marco and maybe it does take Jaime a little while longer to adjust. I’m actually really enjoying watching their battle because although I feel Buemi is stronger I really don’t have any clue how it’ll end up.

I’m not going to give a shopping list of excuses for Webber, seeing as he hasn’t done but the KERS issue is the least of it; he’s lost at least 3 whole sessions due to mechanical failures and most of all a car that’s had 3 different chassis changes compared to his team mate who’s never had to change from day one.
Clearly qualifying has been a problem and at Silverstone we got to see openly the management’s true colours.

I know Mark’s had some bad luck but the problem for me is when Seb bins in in practice (his own daft fault) but then takes the pole and win (such as Turkey and almost the win in Canada) it just feels like nothing can touch him.

I’m glad Mark seems to be getting to grips with the Pirelli tyres and I think his season is just going to get better and better hopefully but even with his bad luck before his lack of pace such as in China qualifying just couldn’t be dressed up for me.

Thanks Kate for the info about thw chassis changes too as I never knew that.

I am a bit surprised by the fact that Keith’s ranking roughly mimics the points rankingâŠ
I mean, you get little teams’ drivers in the lower positions, the renault, saubers, Torro Rosso in the middle and the top 8 at the topâŠ
With the notable exceptions of MSC and KOV, i find it a bitâŠ cautious.
Really, one has to convince me that Massa is doing a better job at Ferrari than Kobayashi at SauberâŠ I mean, he was stripped of his points in Melbourne, and hit by Schmacher, given a stop and go by his own lollypop-man and left stranded by his engine in Silverstone after a nice P8 quali. Apart from that he’s been stellar.
Honestly, i certainly think he’d be much higher in the
championship ranking with a Ferrari, a Macca, let alone a RB !

In some cases I agree but it is very hard to rank drivers differently than the points system. I have tried to rate drivers focusing solely on driving ability in the forum and I ended up with something somewhat related to what the point system has. Who knows, maybe Kovalainen is better than Vettel in reality (example) but looking at what we have we can only conclude that thats incorrect.

Don’t forget that it is easier to shine in a low or medium team than when you’re driving for the top guns.

I could make a long list of drivers who showed huge potential when driving at the midfield, but couldn’t deliver, but I’ll make it short, thinking only of the last 15 years:

Barrichello (has to be the first), Frentzen, Fisichella and Irvine… all of them were hailed as future champions, but couldn’t live to the promisse, while their team-mates were winning the championship, or were very close to do it…

I’d list Coulthard also, but he only went to a smaller team after spending many many years at the top (Williams and McLaren) without a championship title to his name…

Hmmm. I think Heikki’s rated a touch too high, but given how he’s thrashed Trulli this year, I won’t complain. But Timo is definitely rated way too high in my opinion. I’m sorry, but I don’t see how the lead driver of the last-placed team in the WCC (beaten by a barely-surviving HRT) can get a Top-10 ranking, when drivers like Perez or Schumacher can’t.

I think you get it all wrong hereâŠ We rate the driver, not the car !
If you put N Kathikeyan in the red bull next year and F.Alonso in the HRT and , of course, Alonso can’t score a single point but finishes 11th while NK scores the odd 9th or 10th place, will you rate NK gigher than FA ???

why on earth stupid one-finger man shoould be on top? its not so hard 2 b on top with the best car…
alonso should be top1 pushing on every lap, sometimes putting ferrari where it doesn’t deserve to be.
than 2 and 3 for mclaren guys,
4th is vettel followed by webber (as webber is doing much better job on track even after poor quali than rosberg)
6 kobayashi – way better performance than rosberg
7 rosberg or massa…